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Iaboo, Youaboo, Weallaboo for Anime!
- Thread starter Johnny Unusual
- Start date
I am still watching Frieren. It's still heckin good. The current magician exam arc being just that - an arc - is kinda not my favorite. Too much time in one place and a little too much conflict. But it's still a great show.
One of the things I think the show gets praised for, but that people in English speaking communities lack the diction to really articulate, is that this show has a crazy strong sense of "Mono no Aware". A classic Japanese literary concept that doesn't really have a lot of easy parallels to describe it by, but is something I think can be universally appreciated. Last time I felt this evoked so strongly in an anime was probably Mushishi.
One of the things I think the show gets praised for, but that people in English speaking communities lack the diction to really articulate, is that this show has a crazy strong sense of "Mono no Aware". A classic Japanese literary concept that doesn't really have a lot of easy parallels to describe it by, but is something I think can be universally appreciated. Last time I felt this evoked so strongly in an anime was probably Mushishi.
I recently finished the entire Marineford arc of One Piece on Netflix, which is as far as the streamer has of the series (Before jumping 600 episodes to the most recent story arc anyway). It's the last arc before the timeskip so it goes right up to that moment. It's the first time I've seen this arc since broadcast, so seeing it dubbed is also new, and I have some thoughts.
First of all streaming rights have messed up all the opening songs up to this point after the ninth one. Openings ten, eleven, and twleve all use the audio from opening nine with their animation (though this is an improvement for opening twelve because the song for that one suuuuuuuuuucks and tonally did not fit the arc it was paired with). But thankfully, opening thirteen got to use it's actual song, which I'm happy about because it's one of my favorite ones. But unfortunately opening fourteen, the last one before the timeskip, stuck to using thirteen's audio. Freakin' weird-ass streaming rights.
But anyway. Marineford.
This was the arc that more or less broke my interest in watching the anime. (I did watch the arc following it before stopping completely but this is where the damage was done) In the manga this arc was a huge deal, it was ambitious in the number of characters it had and it fundamentally changed the status quo of the world and the characters. There were a lot of large spreads and big action, and this was absolutely not an arc to drag out with filler, these were not chapters you could reasonably use to fill an entire episode of animation. But that's what they did. Hell some episodes used less than a chapter of manga material. The result was a mess. Some episodes had some really slick animation and translated some sequences flawlessly, other episodes felt like 60% static reaction shots and Buggy filler. One episode per week of this arc basically sank my interest in the One Piece anime.
But going back to it like ten years later and watching a couple episodes a day of the English dub and my opinion of it improved somewhat. It's still a mess of an adaption of a great manga arc, but it's a much easier watch that way than the once-a-week episode cadence it was originally. And the dub made it more interesting as well, though it was probably the messiest the Funimation dub has been. This is due to the fact that there are So. Many. Characters. This arc has character after ridiculous character that has maybe one or two lines that nevertheless still need to be distinct and while the casting did well with all the characters that matter, the sheer number of them mean there's still more of them that have, let's say, questionable voices.
MVP of the arc is definitely Colleen Clinkenbeard, though. This arc is probably the screamiest Luffy has ever been, and she just goes ham. I was honestly worried for her vocal chords in a number of places.
But the 'War of the Best' (God that's such a stupid name) is only part of the 'Marineford' listing on Netflix, the second half of it is the fallout from it, Luffy's flashback, and catching up with the main crew all right before the timeskip.
And booooooy, I clearly must be more sensitive to trans issues now than I was like ten years ago because everything about Kamabakka kingdom felt utterly gross. During the actual war the character Ivankov was fine, his english actor did a good job honestly, but even though the localization team clearly tried to smooth over the worst bits of Kamabakka as best they can, there's only so much you can polish a turd. Just scene after scene of some of the ugliest transgender tropes in anime played for yucks. Easily one of the worst things about One Piece.
Shame that's where Netflix's current availability ends (again, disregarding the 600 episode jump up to the most recent arc) since it ended with a rather bad taste in my mouth from that.
But anyway. Marineford.
This was the arc that more or less broke my interest in watching the anime. (I did watch the arc following it before stopping completely but this is where the damage was done) In the manga this arc was a huge deal, it was ambitious in the number of characters it had and it fundamentally changed the status quo of the world and the characters. There were a lot of large spreads and big action, and this was absolutely not an arc to drag out with filler, these were not chapters you could reasonably use to fill an entire episode of animation. But that's what they did. Hell some episodes used less than a chapter of manga material. The result was a mess. Some episodes had some really slick animation and translated some sequences flawlessly, other episodes felt like 60% static reaction shots and Buggy filler. One episode per week of this arc basically sank my interest in the One Piece anime.
But going back to it like ten years later and watching a couple episodes a day of the English dub and my opinion of it improved somewhat. It's still a mess of an adaption of a great manga arc, but it's a much easier watch that way than the once-a-week episode cadence it was originally. And the dub made it more interesting as well, though it was probably the messiest the Funimation dub has been. This is due to the fact that there are So. Many. Characters. This arc has character after ridiculous character that has maybe one or two lines that nevertheless still need to be distinct and while the casting did well with all the characters that matter, the sheer number of them mean there's still more of them that have, let's say, questionable voices.
MVP of the arc is definitely Colleen Clinkenbeard, though. This arc is probably the screamiest Luffy has ever been, and she just goes ham. I was honestly worried for her vocal chords in a number of places.
But the 'War of the Best' (God that's such a stupid name) is only part of the 'Marineford' listing on Netflix, the second half of it is the fallout from it, Luffy's flashback, and catching up with the main crew all right before the timeskip.
And booooooy, I clearly must be more sensitive to trans issues now than I was like ten years ago because everything about Kamabakka kingdom felt utterly gross. During the actual war the character Ivankov was fine, his english actor did a good job honestly, but even though the localization team clearly tried to smooth over the worst bits of Kamabakka as best they can, there's only so much you can polish a turd. Just scene after scene of some of the ugliest transgender tropes in anime played for yucks. Easily one of the worst things about One Piece.
Shame that's where Netflix's current availability ends (again, disregarding the 600 episode jump up to the most recent arc) since it ended with a rather bad taste in my mouth from that.
R.R. Bigman
Coolest Guy
It sort of undermines Frieren’s theme of wistful impermanence to have a Hunter/Chunin Exam that does not seem to end. The show is still fun, but’s it’s kinda just a regular anime now, instead of the enigmatic treat it was before.
I actually get the criticism, but I haven't minded the arc. The anime has had larger story events with slice of life between them, and I'm fine with it.
In sad news: Mutsumi Inomata passed away, far too early. She's worn a lot of hats over the decades as an illustrator, character designer, and animator. She was an animation director on shows like City Hunter. She did Key Animation on shows like Maison Ikkoku. And she did character designs on shows like Future GPX, and Brain Powerd (which hits pretty hard as I'm in the middle of a rewatch of that).
But most of you are probably more familiar with her work on the Tales of Series - where she's been the main character designer for that franchise going back to the SNES days. She'll be sorely missed. For those not familiar with her works, I thought this collection of artwork could serve as a decent sample of the kinds of talent she had: https://characterdesignreferences.com/artist-of-the-week-11/mutsumi-inomata
On more positive news, Big West just announced a partnership with Disney+ to exclusively stream the entire Macross franchise on their service:
Harmony Gold USA's vice grip on the OG series/DYRL means those are excluded from this deal in international, but everything else should make it to Disney+ by year's end. The prospect of Yet Another Subscription is never fun, but I'm just glad people have a chance to officially and legally watch/support the franchise now.
But most of you are probably more familiar with her work on the Tales of Series - where she's been the main character designer for that franchise going back to the SNES days. She'll be sorely missed. For those not familiar with her works, I thought this collection of artwork could serve as a decent sample of the kinds of talent she had: https://characterdesignreferences.com/artist-of-the-week-11/mutsumi-inomata
On more positive news, Big West just announced a partnership with Disney+ to exclusively stream the entire Macross franchise on their service:
Harmony Gold USA's vice grip on the OG series/DYRL means those are excluded from this deal in international, but everything else should make it to Disney+ by year's end. The prospect of Yet Another Subscription is never fun, but I'm just glad people have a chance to officially and legally watch/support the franchise now.
!!!!! Holy shit, that's amazing. Understand people not wanting another subscription, but I've already been on D+ for SW/Marvel stuff and a few other things so this works out for me.
(Lol, I was also about to say I don't see Plus characters on that poster until I realized which VF was flying at my face.)
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It’s the Japan poster. They will probably take Minmay out if they make an ENG ver of it like they did with the recent video game. But Flashback 2012 is not held hostage by Harmony Gold, and Big West does have distribution rights. But future Macross content cannot have any Characters or mechs from the original show now as per their settled agreement. So this new poster of old things might count.
Also feels bad for Sara Nome and Myung/Sharon Apple to not get represented at all in this but I that’s been pretty par for the course for franchise branding/advertisements for a while.
One would hope Disney is ironing out a separate agreement with Harmony Gold to get the original series and DYRL for international release too, but only time will tell on that one.
Also hope Disney is getting the remasters to stream as well; I’ve been pretty burned by Crunchyroll lately only putting up the old VHS/DVD masters for older titles for streaming.
Also feels bad for Sara Nome and Myung/Sharon Apple to not get represented at all in this but I that’s been pretty par for the course for franchise branding/advertisements for a while.
One would hope Disney is ironing out a separate agreement with Harmony Gold to get the original series and DYRL for international release too, but only time will tell on that one.
Also hope Disney is getting the remasters to stream as well; I’ve been pretty burned by Crunchyroll lately only putting up the old VHS/DVD masters for older titles for streaming.
I have never seen a single Evangelion thing but the so-called End of Evangelion is the cinematic event of this Wednesday. I don’t think I have time to start and finish the series before tomorrow; does it make any sense to watch it in theaters anyway?
I'm gonna say... no
It doesn’t make sense to watch if you want a coherent story, but like Classic said — it’s not exactly coherent even if you do have context.
I’d say it’s worth it if you can enjoy something beautiful and nonsensical and deeply weird - as an audacious spectacle. But if have genuine interest in watching the show at some point, I would hold off.
I’d say it’s worth it if you can enjoy something beautiful and nonsensical and deeply weird - as an audacious spectacle. But if have genuine interest in watching the show at some point, I would hold off.
It's totally fine to watch End of Eva for the spectacle, as long as you go in aware that it's basically the extended finale to a TV show you haven't watched, which you clearly know.
If you've already absorbed broad information about the characters it will probably even mostly make sense. If you haven't, it works for some as a standalone experimental film. You're presumably not a completionist about this or you wouldn't be asking the question in the first place, so as long as you don't mind watching the ending first, I think you could have a good time. I kind of want you to try it, to see how it goes for you, personally.
Personally, the reason I'm not going is that I've found the audiences at one-off anime screening events to be incredibly unsocialized (very likely to be either very poorly behaved, very smelly, or both). So, that would be the biggest reason not to go, in my opinion, rather than the content of the thing.
If you've already absorbed broad information about the characters it will probably even mostly make sense. If you haven't, it works for some as a standalone experimental film. You're presumably not a completionist about this or you wouldn't be asking the question in the first place, so as long as you don't mind watching the ending first, I think you could have a good time. I kind of want you to try it, to see how it goes for you, personally.
Personally, the reason I'm not going is that I've found the audiences at one-off anime screening events to be incredibly unsocialized (very likely to be either very poorly behaved, very smelly, or both). So, that would be the biggest reason not to go, in my opinion, rather than the content of the thing.
Very much worth seeing in theaters for me! I ended up watching the first two episodes of the show and the recap (?) movie on Netflix. Aside from that, I truly have managed to absorb almost nothing through osmosis about this show. Regardless, it still felt pretty narratively and emotionally legible to me. It was certainly arresting. Crowd was fine. Crowd is always fine; love going to the movies. Of course I missed a lot but this was a really great experience and I’m glad I saw it now instead of waiting. Not close to most interesting imagery in the movie, but the theater bits would certainly not have hit as well if I were seeing them from my futon in a week or so once I finish the series.
More movies should have their full credits halfway through and then cut to black at the end when the last thing happens…
More movies should have their full credits halfway through and then cut to black at the end when the last thing happens…
Frieren ended last weekend. Solid "and their adventures continued!" non-ending with a new season guaranteed on the horizon. I guess that was a good of a place as any to end on, but still feels kinda bad that this chuuni exam sucked up so much time, and now that it's over the show is over too.
Delicious in Dungeon also hit the halfway point. Aside from that one specific episode (I think it was 3?) where the visuals got extra-Trigger-y, those tendencies were mostly subdued through most of the first half of the show. They're doing a pretty decent job with it so far. Mostly I'm just impressed with how good the directing is? The comedic timing for all the gags are impeccable and translates very well to screen. And that kind of thing doesn't happen without directors who don't know what they're doing/don't have a good handle on comedic timing.
Delicious in Dungeon also hit the halfway point. Aside from that one specific episode (I think it was 3?) where the visuals got extra-Trigger-y, those tendencies were mostly subdued through most of the first half of the show. They're doing a pretty decent job with it so far. Mostly I'm just impressed with how good the directing is? The comedic timing for all the gags are impeccable and translates very well to screen. And that kind of thing doesn't happen without directors who don't know what they're doing/don't have a good handle on comedic timing.
Delicious in Dungeon changed openings in the most recent episode and wow what a downgrade. I mean I know it's hard to follow a Bump of Chicken opening song but it feels like this new one didn't even try.
The dub of Delicuous in Dungeon continues to be really damn good. Senshi via Chilchuk's imagination in the most recent episode made me laugh my ass off.
Still don't like the new opening as much as the first one but I can live with it.
Still don't like the new opening as much as the first one but I can live with it.